That’s a big score for defenders of Internet freedom: On Friday, responding to strong public reactions and grass-roots campaigns, key members of the House and Senate put scheduled votes on the über-contentious SOPA and PIPA bills on ice.

The busy folks at Robert Greenwald’s Brave New Films outfit have kicked off a Web-based campaign to send Karl Rove to the clinker for refusing to honor the subpoena sent by the House Judiciary Committee calling him to testify about his alleged involvement in the prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman.

Discussing the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques” before the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday, former Attorney General John Ashcroft said he didn’t think waterboarding constituted torture and that the technique produced “very valuable” reports. He was testifying on the Bush administration’s interrogation rules.

In this clip from Thursday’s House Judiciary Committee hearing about prisoner interrogation methods at Guantanamo Bay, former Defense Undersecretary Douglas Feith gets into a tense round of questioning with Rep. Keith Ellison about what former Attorney General John Ashcroft did or didn’t tell him about interrogation vis-à-vis the Third Geneva Convention.

Former Attorney General John Ashcroft fumbled as he was point-blanked about the goings-on at Guantanamo Bay during his tenure at the White House, claiming he had “limited recollection” of the events he was there to testify about and claiming he “wasn’t an expert in this arena when I was in office.” Updated

Scott McClellan is making an important stop on Capitol Hill as he continues his book tour to tout that obscure memoir he wrote about being Bush’s press secretary. According to The Huffington Post, McClellan has agreed to testify before the House Judiciary Committee about the Valerie Plame identity leak case and possibly other entries in the list of Bush’s Greatest Hits during McClellan’s time as presidential spokesman.

On Friday, Attorney General Michael Mukasey thwarted the efforts of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other lawmakers to bring White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten and former presidential counsel Harriet Miers before a federal grand jury for ignoring subpoenas to testify before the House Judiciary Committee about the firings of nine U.S. attorneys in 2006.

President Bush has told his former White House counsel, Harriet E. Miers (pictured), not to even appear before the House Judiciary Committee in its investigation into the firings of U.S. attorneys, the committee chairman said Wednesday. The panel was to hear from Miers on Thursday.

Updated: The AP is reporting that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has been subpoenaed by the House Judiciary Committee, requiring him to turn over documents detailing the recent firings of several U.S. attorneys.